New Mexico Lawmakers Demand Answers on a Military GPS Jamming Crash

On August 5, 2026, New Mexico’s full congressional delegation sent a letter to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth demanding answers about a military GPS-jamming exercise the NTSB says was active when an air ambulance struck a mountain range in May, killing all four people aboard.

What happened in the Capitan Mountains

According to the National Transportation Safety Board’s preliminary report, a Beechcraft King Air C90, registration N249CP, departed Roswell Air Center just before midnight on May 13, 2026, on a positioning flight to Sierra Blanca Regional Airport near Ruidoso to pick up a patient bound for Albuquerque.

The aircraft was operated by Generations Jets under Part 135 as an air ambulance flight; the two flight nurses aboard worked for Trans Aero Medical Services. About eight minutes after takeoff, the crew told air traffic control they had lost GPS capability and needed a heading.

Air traffic controllers got the military to briefly pause a scheduled GPS-jamming exercise, but it resumed about five minutes before the crash, shortly after the crew reported the airport in sight and was cleared for a visual approach in the dark. The airplane struck terrain at 9,950 feet, about 730 feet east and 230 feet below the Capitan Mountains’ 10,180-foot summit.

All four aboard, both pilots and both flight nurses, were killed. A post-impact fire grew into what became known as the Seven Cabins Fire, which burned more than 30,000 acres and cost an estimated $37.7 million to fight, according to the lawmakers’ letter.

A live jamming exercise, in real time

The interference came from NAVFEST, an annual U.S. Air Force electronic-warfare exercise at White Sands Missile Range that tests military GPS jamming and was published by NOTAM before the flight. The NTSB’s report notes that three other aircraft in the area also reported losing GPS that same night.

Coordination between air traffic control and the range happened by phone, in real time, while controllers were also vectoring the crew around the dark, mountainous terrain. A supervisor asked the range to stop jamming twice; the second pause ended once the crew reported the airport in sight.

Congress wants answers, and possibly reimbursement

The letter, signed by Senators Martin Heinrich and Ben Ray Luján and Representatives Gabe Vasquez, Teresa Leger Fernández, and Melanie Stansbury, was first reported by Source New Mexico. It asks whether the Pentagon will compensate the victims’ families and reimburse the federal, state, and local agencies that fought the wildfire.

If the DoD had not been jamming GPS in the region at the time of this crash, it is very likely that the crash would have never occurred, four people would still be alive, and this wildfire would not have started.

The lawmakers also want the Pentagon to cooperate fully with the NTSB’s investigation and to work with the FAA on protocols to prevent a repeat. The NTSB has not determined a probable cause, and a final report is not expected until 2027.